


She Still Calls Him Spaceman

by Ray_Writes



Series: Tumblr Prompts [36]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s04e15 Planet of the Dead, F/M, Post-Episode AU: s04e13 Journey's End
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-18
Updated: 2018-08-18
Packaged: 2019-06-29 01:40:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15719310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ray_Writes/pseuds/Ray_Writes
Summary: Coincidence brings the Doctor and Donna back together yet again.





	She Still Calls Him Spaceman

**Author's Note:**

> Right, so this is meant to be one of many simple sentence prompts which an anon was gracious enough to indulge me in requesting over on tumblr. I decided to turn this one into yet another fix-it idea. I know, typical. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy!

It was a miracle. An Easter miracle, which, considering the teachings of Christian mythology, perhaps ought to be the phrase.

Or perhaps it was merely coincidence. Another coincidence that had put Donna Noble on the exact same bus at the exact same time and in the exact moment that they all passed through some sort of wormhole. 

He’d gone to investigate their new desert landscape, only to turn around at the sounds of others disembarking, one voice in particular rising above the rest.

“Alright, where the  _ hell _ are we?”

“Donna?” Too late, he’d remembered he wasn’t meant to know that name, but she’d zeroed right in on him.

“Spaceman?”

“But- but your head! How—?”

“I’m fine. Think I’m fine, anyway,” she’d said as he’d scrambled over the sand to get to her. “That wormhole must’ve triggered that defense mechanism-thing, only it all got swallowed up on the trip.”

“Swallowed? No, that can’t be right. The bus should’ve protected us.” He’d ran back inside, squeezing around people to get a look at where Donna had been sitting.

“Oh! You had the window cracked open!”

“Yeah, had a bit of a headache. Thought it would help.”

“Well, it would’ve killed you if you didn’t have a store of regeneration energy sitting in your head.” He’d managed to get the window shut with great difficulty; they’d need it for the trip back. Then he’d ran back down to where Donna had stood.

“But you’re right. You’re fine. Completely fine.”

It still hadn’t hit him quite yet. Standing there, a smile slowly overtaking his face as Donna stared back at him. Seeing him, not looking right through him like the last time. He drew in a breath, not sure if he meant to say something or simply laugh in pure delight—

“You didn’t miss me at all, did you?”

The Doctor blinked. “What? Why would you think that?”

She gestured with an arm to Christina, who had followed right after him onto the bus and back out into the sun. “Martha’s right about you. It’s just one after the other!”

“No! No, no, no, no, no, Donna, we just met! Honest!”

“Yeah, yeah,” she said, though she did not sound at all as though she agreed with him. “Listen, lady. I’ve been there before. Best to run for the dunes.”

“Donna!”

“You can’t exactly deny you’ve got a track record. I mean, you left me wandering around with my head barely working. Hardly anything in it on the days I wasn’t bedridden from the migraines—”

“Why were you having headaches?” He asked. That was the second time she’d mentioned them.

“Gee, maybe cos of the great mass of Time Lord brain pressing up against my own? You ever think of that?”

He gaped at her for a long moment. “It...wasn’t supposed to work like that?”

“Yeah, cos any of us knew how it was supposed to work since it’d never been done before.”

“Donna, I never meant—”

“Right, you two clearly have things to talk about,” Christina interrupted. “I’ll be over here organizing the rest of this lot whenever you’re ready to think about surviving.”

“Oh sure, don’t mind us. Just keep working on your companion audition tape, Miss,” Donna called after her.

“Donna she’s not — I mean I wasn’t—”

“Oh, save it, Spaceman,” she said, though there was no bite to it. Rather, it came out on a sigh. He was able to notice then the bags under her eyes and the paleness to her cheeks. Was she thinner? Had she not been eating?

“Could ask you the same,” Donna muttered, which made him realize he’d asked both those things out loud.

“Donna, I’m so sorry. I did miss you. Terribly.”

She wasn’t looking at him. But he was still Spaceman. That had to count for something, didn’t it?

“You really don’t understand. I’ve traveled, but it- it’s not the same. It’s boring. The universe is boring without you!” The Doctor declared, arms flung out wide. "Anytime I think I might be about to have a  _ bit _ of fun, all I can think is how much you’d have loved it if you were there.”

“And whose fault is that?”

His shoulders drooped. “I know.”

Donna sighed again. “So what happens now?”

“Now we’ve got to find a way back. I haven’t got the TARDIS.”

Her lips quirked. “Yeah, what were you doing on a bus anyway?”

“I take buses,” he said. “We took a bus, remember? Back to your reception when the TARDIS needed time to air out.”

“I think I’d have clobbered you if that one had gone through a wormhole.”

“Wormhole’s aren’t so bad,” he decided. “This one brought you back.”

She finally lifted her eyes from the sand. “Say it again. Please?”

It didn’t need asking, but it most certainly needed saying.

“Donna Noble, I missed you more than words can say.”

She gave him a wobbly smile that he returned, and then she was launching herself into his arms just the way he’d remembered and loved. He held her tight against him, and, for the briefest of moments allowed his lips to brush the top of her head.

“Let’s go home.”

“Let’s go home,” he agreed.

Donna pulled back and drew in a breath. Then she turned sharp on her heels and marched into the center of the group. “Right then, you lot!”

He grinned and hurried along after.


End file.
